Talk:Harmonia axyridis

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Arthropods, a collaborative effort to improve and expand Wikipedia's coverage of arthropods. If you would like to participate, visit the project page where you can join the project and/or contribute to discussion.
B This article has been rated as B-class on the quality scale.
Mid This article has been rated as mid-importance on the importance scale.

Article Grading:
The following comments were left by the quality and importance raters: (edit · refresh)

Given that this species is a major invasive from points of introduction, and that by many it is considered a pest, does it not warrant high importance status?—GRM (talk) 18:31, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Personal Experience

A bit off-topic, although possibly interesting to some...These beetles are common in central Ohio where I went to college. They are commonly known on campus as "Evil Lady-Bugs" and most definitely swarm entire dormitories and quads and are seen as heavy nuisances. My roommate and I had a problem when the exhaust fan in the window, which was covered in duct tape to prevent their entry, would still let them in. They would travel around the edges of the screen, through the center of the fan (one could occasionally hear them smacking the blades), eventually to attempt to burrow under the duct-tape into the warm room. The adhesive, however, proved to strong for an individual beetle, however, due to the swarming nature of these insects, the next would usually try to burrow under the previous beetle. We then had trails of lady-beetles coming into the dorm-room through the fan under the legs of their comrades. They will do ANYTHING to get indoors (nice piece of evolution Miss Nature...) which gives them the pest status. If possible, as it's starting to get cold, I'll attempt to get a nice original picture of this swarming nature...do you think the community would like that?

These things are horrible pests. And unlike regular ladybugs, they bite. They also seem to be getting progressively worse, to the point that they are now a problem all year round. I'd take aphids over these awful things any day. There is no good justification for the introduction of this species. Whoever is responsible for it deserves a good kick in the groin. CyberRaptor 07:10, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Actually, regular ladybugs bite, too. It's just that the native ladybugs are generally not present in such large numbers that their biting is really noticeable. As for justification, the USDA was struggling for decades to introduce this species, because they wanted to control pest aphids - there are a lot of farmers and big agricultural corporations in the US, and they expect the government to help control pests, because the American consumer wants pest-free crops, and tax dollars support the USDA. The Asian lady beetle is ultimately here because the American consumer/taxpayer wanted it, and paid for it. Dyanega 18:11, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
And now we have to pay exterminators to dispose of them for us when they invade our homes. Did it ever occur to anyone that the reason it was so hard to introduce them is because they simply don't belong here? I'm quite opposed to the practice of introducing non-native species in general. There's no telling what the ultimate consequences will be, and it usually results in upsetting of the local ecosystem. The article itself states that it has been the case with this insect. It may have helped somewhat with aphid control, but my dad works for the DNR and he says that they have not been as beneficial as was originally expected. CyberRaptor 22:28, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
Not to belabor the point, but even the best quarantine-based research on possible impacts of the ALB's introduction would never have revelaed that they would spend the winter in people's homes. That was something that could never have been anticipated. Look at it this way: all over the world, people introduce non-native species for various purposes; sometimes it is done intelligently, sometimes not. Sometimes the results are truly beneficial, sometimes not. And, sometimes those results could have been predicted, and sometimes not. Those are three separate things, and in the case of the ALB, the introduction was only moderately intelligent (not a lot of study went into it beforehand), the results have been economically very beneficial but ecologically and culturally fairly negative, and the results were mostly predictable, aside from the "overwinter in homes" trick. The USDA has done better, and it's also done worse. You can bet that were it not for the home invasions, you would probably never have heard of this beetle or its impact on native ladybug species. Just consider the ladybugs Coccinella septempunctata and Propylaea quattuordecimpunctata - also introduced species with a profound negative impact on our native ladybugs, but who in the public is even aware that they exist, let alone that they aren't native to North America? Dyanega 23:01, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
There was an old lady who swallowed a fly...... --Calibas 23:59, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
The little buggers have reached Quebec. Bloody American idiots :( Pendragon39 03:43, 1 May 2007 (UTC)
Idiots indeed. I hate those things and I'm sorry, but no Canadian tax payer ever wanted to have those things around. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dez26 (talk • contribs) 01:25, 11 May 2007 (UTC).

I had these things in the Army barracks when I was in Alabama. I taped up the windows but they still found a way in. I used to spray the windows with raid and bang them. Piles of dead lady bugs would fall. People got mad at me for killing them but there were thousands of them. It was disgusting. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.65.244.151 (talk) 01:46, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Variety of Shell Patterns

There is a very nice image showing the wide variety of shell patterns that give this ladybird its name available at various places on the Web (same basic image, viz: http://www.wildlifetrust.org.uk/cheshire/news_ladybird.htm and http://web.apu.ac.uk/appsci/lifesci/lifestaff/harlequin_01.htm). I have included the first (the best link IMO) in the External Links section, but would like to use the image directly. I have no idea as to the provenance of this image (Googling wasn't very revealing as to the original source), but am attempting to find out. In the meantime, maybe someone who knows the rules for image linking better than I would like to decide if it is OK to attach this image to the article. Xpi6 11:15, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

We're trying to reduce non-free images down to the bare minimum (unique historical events, etc), and these would be supplementary, not the only image in existence. One thing you can do is to email the organization and ask them if they would be willing to license a copy under, for instance, {{CC-by}} (don't simply ask for permission to use! we need them to use a license that has all the terms spelled out). Since the Wildlife Trust wants to get the word out, and WP is in the top 30 of all websites for traffic, the increased visibility should be a pretty good incentive for them. Wikipedia:Boilerplate request for permission has form letters you can work from. Good luck! Stan 14:03, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Geographical bias

It is pretty obvious that this basic article has been written from a US perspective. Ideally, I would think it best to start with information from the species' natural range (presumably Asia), but then also to balance the article out with more info from Europe and elsewhere. The species seems pretty well established in the south of England now (I collected my first 2 specimens last week near Cambridge)—GRM 20:35, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

There is little or no information from its native range. Like most insects, it only receives attention when it's a pest. As it has a much longer history as a pest in the United States, the article - not surprisingly - reflects this. Dyanega 21:21, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Given the diversity of "English" names, is this a good candidate for relocation to a page headed by the scientific name?—GRM 20:38, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

I would support this, for precisely this reason, but only if you are willing to go through and fix all of the links that will be broken as a result of the move. That basic issue is behind a lot of the "inertia" in Wikipedia, it seems. Dyanega 21:25, 23 October 2007 (UTC)
You just make this page, Asian lady beetle, redirect to Harmonia axyridis and no links should be broken. If you want to make sure there's always: Special:Whatlinkshere/Asian_lady_beetle. Calibas 05:38, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
By "broken" I meant "turned from a direct link into a redirect link" - if all of the links will point to a redirect page instead of the actual page, most editors consider that to need fixing (and if it needs fixing, it's broken) -- and some of them even turn into double redirects. Do you know how to transfer the talk page from here to there? After all, the Harmonia axyridis page already exists, so you can't do a simple move. Dyanega 06:15, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
You need an admin to move everything (talk page, history, etc...). There's a tag you put in the article, then we discuss it for a week or so and finally they do a full move of the page. For the broken links there's bots that can fix them in a couple minutes, I think it may be an automatic part of the move process now. Calibas 19:10, 24 October 2007 (UTC)
From experience with other pages, I'd say that the MOVE is simple. You just do it and it sorts out the old redirect page (from scientific to English name) and takes the Talk page with it. It is, however, very time-consuming to fix the "broken" links. Maybe someday soon I'll do it :-) —GRM 19:35, 25 October 2007 (UTC)
Sorry folks, I can't do it, because of the existing Redirect page. I have posted it up for the attention of admin—GRM 17:16, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

That was precisely the point I was making above; if the redirect page had not been there, I would've made the move myself earlier. Dyanega 17:29, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Netherlands

Does someone know when the first one was found in the Netherlands?Mweites (talk) 10:24, 24 November 2007 (UTC) found it and put it in article.Mweites (talk) 16:17, 5 December 2007 (UTC)